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Monday, April 30, 2012

Back in January when I was preparing for the vintage show I did a reality check on my Braves team set needs. My ever-increasingly out of date online wantlists showed I had completed the 1970 Topps Braves team set. But...... when I checked the binder it was missing card 413, Sonny Jackson. Now, I could see that card in my head. Sonny with the glasses doing the fake bunt pose. Wasn't in the binder, though. No clue where it was. I assumed that I had just misplaced the card and looked through some stuff. Didn't find it. Looked through some more stuff, still didn't find it. Eventually - knowing full well I had that damn card somewhere - I ended up buying it for something like 30 cents on COMC. Found my other copy literally the same day the COMC package arrived. Oh well, I've got one for my 1970 Topps set now. Here's the whole shebang, even though I may have posted it already a few years ago.

Topps was nice enough to announce on their Twitter feed that Bryce Harper will be in Series Two Topps. As a regular or short print, who knows. All I know is I don't need that jazz because I already have a 1/1 Harper sketch card.

Thursday, April 26, 2012

Swag means something different nowadays from what it meant when I was a kid but oh well.

Every 8 months or so I get drunk and spend a Jackson over on Check Out My Cards. This happened once again a couple of weeks ago. Someone on Twitter mentioned there were cheap Rickey Henderson rookies on COMC, I checked it out, started wandering about the site, found a card I had to have or ELSE and ended up picking out a handful of cardboard to have shipped to my house. A combination of busyness and confusion and procrastination has left me with a death of ideas for posting (well, other than the dozens of posts stuck in my draft folder) so let's go ahead and show them off. To go with Rainbow Dash, here's a...

Rainbow Medlen. Twilight Diamond Sparkle, Transmogrifier Set parallel and Liquorfractor. Instant Meds Rainbow Starter Set. Of course now I need to track down the Gold border, Black border, Blue Sparkle and any other weird parallels that are out there but I'm off to a good start at least!

Saturday, April 21, 2012

The My Little Pony Royal Princess Wedding is happening RIGHT NOW, and I'm embarrassing myself trying to coach little league baseball whole I have a splitting headache from waking up a 4 in the morning with heartburn and not getting any sleep and after the game I get to go to Costco oh joy. So I don't get to see the wedding live online, I have to wait for YouTube. Wanna piss me off for posting ponies? Watch the episode and post spoilers to Twitter and my blog. No that isn't just a sneaky way of getting you to watch ponies, really I swear.

Here's the last of the '63s, Hall of Famer Billy Williams. This guy is so underrated it's stupid. I swear, if I had a pony for every time someone said Billy Williams isn't a Hall of Famer, I'd have... well... even more ponies than I already have. AND THAT'S A LOTTA PONIES. Just check out this Gem Mint specimen. Scuffs and scrapes all over the card, but not enough to scrape off the 49 year old wax. Perfectly rounded corners. Creases everywhere. And last but not least, SIX - count em - SIX staples were used to mount this thing to some object that was instantly beautified by its presence. Can you imagine the work it took to get this card looking like this? It doesn't just happen by itself, this kind of wear takes effort. Go ahead, take one of those newfangled Heritage cards you've been opening up by the handful and make it look as good as this, I dare ya.

UPDATE: My family abandoned me to ponies so I got to watch the episode when it aired. Holy crap was that good. At 44 minutes, it was slightly rushed in points but they squoze as much epicness in as they could. Celestia knows how the hell they're going to top that in season 3.

This post was supposed to lament the fact that Ponies debuted a few months after Dr. Demento's last show aired on June 6th 2010 meaning that all the ridiculous pony mashups that have been created never got a chance to be on the show. Then to my surprise, I find out that he's been doing streaming internet shows since then and never really left. Didn't find ponies in the playlist but April 7th's show has baseball songs!

And yes, I love this music unironically, just like I love Fish Heads, Bulbous Bouffant and Dogs Singing Jingle Bells. That's how I roll.

Here's a card of Roger Maris' 1962 World Series game 3 heroics where he drove in two runs and scored a third in the 7th inning to lead the Damn Yankees to victory. Problem is, that picture sure as hell isn't of the 7th inning of that game. Here we see #9 Maris on 1st base and #32 Elston Howard taking an awkward swing at the plate. In the 7th inning of game 3, Roger hit a single with Mickey Mantle on 2nd and Tom Tresh on 3rd and advanced to second base on an error by Willie McCovey. Roger was never on first when Howard was up in the 7th inning, so what inning is this? It's not the second inning, Maris flied out to right. In the 4th, Roger grounded out to 1st base to end the inning. We know what he did in the 7th inning... aaaaaand that was it for Roger that day. So this photo isn't actually from game 3.

I wish the photo was sharp enough to show a pinstripe on a uniform so I could confirm this photo was from a Yankee home game. I have no knowledge of old-time stadiums so for all I know, this game is obviously being played in Candlestick and I'm barking up the wrong tree but I'm assuming the photo was taken in New York. All you SABR guys point and laugh if I'm wrong. I looked through the box scores and found three possibilities for this photograph:

Second inning - Flyball out to center.
Fourth inning - Groundout unassisted to first base.Sixth inning - Roger walked. Elston flew out to right on his at bat.

Game 5:
First inning - Fly out to left to end the inning.Fourth inning - Roger made it to first on a fielder's choice, Elston Howard then struck out.
Sixth inning - Ground out to second base.Eighth inning - Roger walked, Elston flew out to center.

If this pic was actually taken in New York during the 1962 World Series (I can't tell if that catcher is a Giant, can you?) then it was probably taken in the 6th inning of game 4 or the 4th or 8th inning of game 5. That's all I got until MLB stops hoarding their vintage game footage like a dragon hoards gold. Can anyone else out there pinpoint this moment?

Today has not gone quite as expected and I do not particularly appreciate Google's little joke of COMPLETELY revamping Blogger's post creation page on 4/20 but I'mma post something today if it kills me. Here's Pinkie Pie enjoying the holiday a little too much instead of collecting cards like a good pony.

And here's a 1963 Rookie Stars card from 1963. Don't laugh, there actually were 1962 Rookie Stars cards from 1963.

Angels,Colt .45s Twins and Mets. Four (mostly) brand spankin' new teams at the time. Don't know who any of these dudes are and don't have time to go hunting for them on the interwebs but I do appreciate the floaty heads.

Thursday, April 19, 2012

Earl Battey and Elston Howard are featured in this '63 Combo card. With no inset circle the combos are the plainest cards in the set, but there's plenty of room for the photo. This pic might have been taken at the first 1962 All-Star game in Washington since Earl and Elston are both in the home pinstripes. I'm worn out and am getting a headache and just wanna go to bed so I'll just linky SABR's biographies on Elston and Earl here instead of summarizing them up.

I R Punny. I'm guessing I left descreening off or scanned at 150 dpi or something because this scan has a lovely moiré pattern. I was pleasantly surprised to find this for a buck in the '63 box as it's from the tough 523-576 high series. For some reason the 6th series (447-522) is even tougher. Further confusing the issue is that the checklists say the 6th series is cards 430-506 and the 7th series is 507-576. Either the checklists are lying or the price guides are. Or YOU are. Maybe I'm the liar. Hell, I'm probably lying right now. Prove that I'm not! Anyway high numbered cards cost more because scarcity or something (economics!) and I got one cheap so yay me. Brohoof for the Duffalo!

Wednesday, April 18, 2012

The last '63 card I picked up for my 1st series set was this American League Victory Leaders card. Floaty heads for the win! Literally. At first glance this may not seem like a super-star-studded specimen but these were some fine pitchers in the early '60s. Let's go down the list, shall we?

Ralph Terry won 23 games for the Yankees in '62, easily his career year. No Cy Young award for Terry that year since the award had not been split into one for each league yet and Don Drysdale owned all other pitchers that year. Terry did get his only all star nods and a World Series MVP so he did pretty well for himself. Not only that, he was a helluva golfer. The thing he's most known for though is coughing up a phone run in 1960 to some dude named Mazeroski.

Ray Herbert also had a career year in 1962 with his only 20-win season. In his defense, he played for the crummy Kansas City A's and not the mighty Yankees. Ray had the season winning percentage crown in '62 and also was the winning pitcher in the second All Star Game that year. You say you need more trivia? He gave up Carl Yastrzemski's first hit.

Camilo Pascual is one of the best pitchers from the '60s that you've never heard of. From 1959 to 1964 he won 100 games for the Senators and Twins. He also had 7 all star appearances and lead the league in strikeouts three times and complete games three times during that period. Dude could pitch.

Dick Donovan was originally signed by the Braves, but was out of the bigs in '63. He won 18 games for the Atlanta Crackers in '64 and the White Sox picked him up. He had his career year for the Sox in '57, going 16-6 and coming in second to Warren Spahn in the Cy Young voting. After being picked up in the expansion draft by Washington, he was traded to the Indians for the '62 season and came up with a 20-win season for the Tribe. As far as I know, he has no cards as a Brave which irritates me.

Jim Bunning is a Hall of Famer and a Senator, but he only won 19 games in '62 so I'm not even gonna talk about him.

Not gonna lie, I'm wiped tonight and I don't wanna do anything but I have three posts to write and I'm gonna power through 'em so I can go to bed really quick.

I've always been mildly fascinated with cards from franchises who moved cities. Not terribly surprising since my team is on its third city so far. Brookyln Dodgers, St. Louis Browns, Washington Senators, New York Giants, Seattle Pilots, Philadelphia A's. I don't count the Montreal Expos because they should still exist, goddamnit. The one defunct team I never really cared about was the Kansas City A's. I'm not even sure why. When I was a kid I would go bonkers for a Browns or a Senators card, but the KC A's was just a big meh. I don't think the word meh even existed back then, but they were still meh. Maybe it's because I thought the Philadelphia A's and Connie Mack were cooler. Maybe it was because I was a child of the '80s and couldn't think of Kansas City without seeing Royal Blue. Maybe it was because many of the sets I had KC A's cards from (1955, 1957, 1961, 1962) were kinda meh themselves.

Tonight I think I might have finally figured it out. Notice that the striking red and yellow border of this card of Ed Rakow goes nicely with his uniform. But wait, the A's unis are supposed to have yellow on them. These are red. A's aren't red! They're yellow and green! Up until 1963 when they finally went green, the KC A's uniforms were red and blue. Thinking back on it, the only KC A's card I remember fondly from when I was a kid was a Rene Lachemann card I picked out of a bargain box. Green uniform. That's an A.

He was a star for the Senators/Twins!
He was the Rookie of the Year in 1959!
He hit 30 or more homers three times!
He hit 29 homers a couple of other seasons!
His batting average wasn't all that great but he could draw walks and had a good OBP!
He was an All-Star 3 times!
He was a dang good player and shouldn't be relegated to the common box!

That would make a good game... Everyone gets 10 bucks and they have to build the best team with that cash from vintage bargain boxes. Winner takes all. Vintage card rotisserie... I should patent that.

Ok, so the inclusion of Pretty Party Ponies in the last 1963 Topps card post was apparently a hit, so I'm going to blatantly pander to you all and include ponies in every post. Aren't you excited!!!

Here's another '63 Topps card I bought instead of a pack of 2012 Heritage.

Augh! A Cub! I must make fun of Cubs right now because I am angry because I can't see 75% of Braves games on Atlanta TV but every friggin Cubs game is on WGN and I have a Deep Dark Cub Secret I have delayed in admitting to in public. Hint: eventually I'll have to post another video on Youtube. Three things I really like about this card:

1/88th of a 1963 Topps first series set
That freaky blank stare cubbie logo amuses me.
DEM GLASSES

Oddity: of the 4 green-bordered cards I got in this '63 Binge this is the only one with a yellow circle for the inset photo. I'm too lazy to go check my set to see how uncommon that is, but I like the combo.

Monday, April 16, 2012

Qypsy Gueen drops this week so I'm commemorating the event by showing off all the 1963 Topps cards I picked up instead of buying new packs of 2012 Heritage. I don't know what I'll do next month since I can't afford original Gypsy Queen cards from the 1880's. This will keep the blog busy all week while I'm obsessing over a Pretty Princess Pony Royal Wedding.

No, really, I'm disturbingly geeked up over this thing. Vinyl Scratch is in it! DJ PON-3 in the hizzouse! Plus Twilight Sparkle looks adorable as, um, Flower Foal or Best Mare or whatever the heck she's supposed to be in the wedding party. If The Great And Powerful Trixie shows up as a wedding guest I'm gonna lose my shit. The blog might be renamed The Great And Powerful Trixie Junkie by this time next week. This is not out of the realm of possibility as Trixie is actually getting her own toy in this fall's MLP line from Hasbro. You all may laugh at my pony addiction, but my crazy antics have apparently caused an actual girl to become interested in watching My Little Pony. Think about that for a minute.

Ok, so what I done did dood it? A week or two ago (you can probably find the exact date on my Twitter feed) I hit the card shop and bought some vintage '63s instead of ripping packs of Heritage. Because I'm one of those troublemaking never satisfied collectors who eschew carefully planned marketing strategies and buy what I damn well please. I picked up some old, beat up singles that cost about the same as maybe three or four packs of the new stuff. I'll let you all decide if I made the right choice. I'm going to show them off in the order in which I scanned them, which is to say, completely randomly.

Here's number 56 from the set, the rookie card of Phillies pitcher Dennis Bennett. I sadly discovered about a minute ago that Mr. Bennett had passed away less than a month ago. This card is from the first series set. It's one of the series I'm focusing on completing along with the first series of 1960, '65 and '71 and the third series of '72 Topps. It's also the first series I actively tried to work on, as I bought up every 1963 Topps first series common card at the old Atlanta Sports Cards in the mid-'80s. I refused to buy them unless they were unlisted in Beckett and I could get them for twenty-five cents a pop. Dennis here, being a rookie card, didn't make the cut back then. The price a couple decades later didn't go up all that much as I picked this one up for a buck.

The Collective Troll picked up my idea for an Allen & Ginter mini FrankenSet and ran with it. Ran so much that his is already pretty much finished. He accumulated a fair number of dupes and sent a few my way to help finish mine out. Behold: 36 minis from the Troll:

Out of the 36 we had a 50% success ratio for filling up holes in the set. There were also a handful of upgrades too! Will all those holes being plugged I had a fair amount of pages getting completed. Here's just over a quarter of a complete A&G FrankenSet.

I'm down to only needing 22 cards to complete and I have a large pile of minis that didn't make the cut. If you could use some of them, let me know.

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About Me

One man's tireless crusade to promote card collecting as an addictive alternative to more pharmacological pursuits. Remember kids: Do Drugs, Cards have gotten entirely too stupid. Or don't, see if I care when you RUIN YOUR LIFE FOREVER

Dayf the Blogger has a Posse

My original crappy neglected blog what I'm trying to resurrect this year

Note on the Blogroll

If you have a blog, and it ain't on here, LET ME KNOW! There are a lot of good blogs I'm missing out on. I'm also very forgetful and sometimes forget to put it on the list even if I do find a good one. If your blog is about cards or trading or sports in general I'll fit it in, but don't try to sneak your blog about politics or cats or crop rotation in the 14th century on here.